back in the world

tues 5/19  2:08 am (pg 202 of 273)

rocking and rolling
clocking pages

mon 5/18   11:47 pm (pg 191 of 274)



POETICA POETICA:

my fondest memory of the two summers I went to cuba was me walking down the street with my crew, when this woman, an attendant in an open air museum started yelling poetica poetica, I had done the opening ceremony with the legendary nancy morejon that morning, threw down in her honor, bells and fetishes, (its cuba right, every hit I played off the hoodoo ritual connections,) made the news, later walking through auction square, old havana, museum attendant gets excited, rapid spanish, folk translate, she saw you on tv, poetica, she tells her friends, poetica, poetica, then she starts busting out my moves -

SING, HOODOOMAN, SING

havana loved the mbira but we had commo issues, pierre set up a outdoor gig in this park wo making it clear to me he wanted me to throw down full regalia & instrumentation, and even with james as my roadie schlepping that mbira on buses taking us to gigs or in taxis by myself it just wasn’t worth the hassle unless I knew I was hitting, so he was disappointed I hadnt brought it, seems he had come to me w/more respect than I had realized, 1^st year they had me on the 10 minute slots assembly line, 2^nd year I was one of the featured folk, real readings where I got a half hour or so to really stretch out, this one reading at this brothers community center where me y mi hermano dueted mbiras, this reading at a medical college were they were so proud of training cubas legendary medical corp, the one I missed in the park I hated I missed cause ]it drew a raucous crowd of folk from the community and when it got rained out, glad my mbira didn’t get rained upon, we relocated to a nearby building with glass walls and we had a great show with the tropical rain lashing the glass and I woulda had a good time with that congregation and hated I didn’t have my instruments but I threw down with some of the shine that had made me a walking legend in these parts and at one point somebody pulls me aside and says they are going to have a ceremony for you but we got that language thing and ongoing confusion I kinda dismiss it as another miscommo, but that next morning pierre is insistent, be at such and such spot at such and such a time, so at the designated time me and james and cherisse mosey on down and its some sort of big cultural fair and pierre sees me and he conducts me into this restricted space where civic mucky mucks are speechifying in spanish, me, james and cherise are escorted in, james and cherisse find seats but Im instructed where to sit and to make a long story short at some point they bring me up and give me some kind of proclamation, the key to the city basically, and Im very moved and my heart is full and I thank them and I go to sit down cause its been a sober assemblage, when the crowd start chanting - sing hoodooman sing, sing hoodooman sing

and so I sang




sun 5/17 11:47 pm (pg 185 of 273)



so i got 8 pages today but i also took
6 off the top, thats even better, means
im weaning out the narrative trash

sat 5/16 10;05 pm (pg 177 of 279)

hello world, been off the grid
onliest way to get melissa done

im retiring from reading manuscripts
didnt go to graduation yesterday
im zoomed out and im retired

and im back in the saddle

did about 4 pages yesterday, 
1st time since last we spoke

177 pages of 279 to go
at 10 pages a day means

10 days, you can do this
rick, 10 pages a day will get
me to the promised land

all my life i train for
spurts like this

i may moan and groan for the public but
there is no doubt in my mind Ima do this

when it come to my discipline
i do not miss the mark

im rdoc

god lord willing and
the crick dont rise